


aerith

by keiyoko



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, not sure what else to say
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-22
Updated: 2018-09-22
Packaged: 2019-07-15 16:12:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16066703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keiyoko/pseuds/keiyoko
Summary: a sort-of retelling of final fantasy vii, told as a myth about flowers





	aerith

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this for a school assignment and now it's here for general consumption, enjoy

Long, long ago, before spires of metal towered over the skyline and boxes on four wheels polluted the air, before humans forgot their origins and old ways of life, there was the Cetra.  They were People of the Planet, who could speak to Gaia, Mother Nature herself, and lived unburdened and free as man was meant to do. The Cetra lived a nomadic life, never settling in one place and communed with the earth wherever they went.  Where the voice of the planet was the strongest, they would go there and bring life to the land there.  After that, they would continue to travel, spreading trees and nature as far as they could reach, hoping that with each new place, they would find the Promised Land, a place of ultimate happiness.

With the Cetra, came the humans.  They too were Cetra, brothers if not in blood but in body, but they abandoned the Cetra's nomadic ways.  Legend says that some Cetra had betrayed their kin, giving in to the evil spirits that hid in the shadows cast by the Cetra's light, but the truth was that they were tired.  Constant travel began to wear them out, and age weakened their bones, exhausted their life-bringing powers.  So they settled in one place, willingly giving up their Cetra heritage to become something else.

No longer could they speak to Gaia, or the earth under their feet, could no longer coax life to sprout from the land and they became the humans that we are today.  

Amid the Cetra was a story they told around fires at night when the moon was high in the sky.  There would be a Cetra unlike any other, able to do more than just bring life with their powers.  Gaia's voice came to them when she was born; Ilfalna's newborn child would be the fabled Cetra to ever walk the planet.  Aerith, her mother named her, for it was Old Cetran for Earth.  Her people rejoiced when she was born, celebrating everything Aerith would do when she was older.

Aerith, ever the gifted child, proved Gaia's words true from a young age.  She could hear the voice of the planet when the other children her age had yet to hear the spirits of the mountains and the wind, and spoke to Gaia as the Cetra elders only could.  From there, her connection to Gaia only grew with each passing year.  Plants sprouted from the dirt where she touched it, the green seedlings growing taller and taller the longer she knelt.  Gaia responded to Aerith's sweet voice when she spoke, and the planet would be covered in life for miles around.  Only Aerith could wield her power in this way, for Gaia loved Aerith as if she were its own child, as if she were a sequoia always reaching to touch the sky, or a strong river carving its path through the ground.  

If Aerith asked something of the earth, Gaia would give it to her.  She was beloved by all, and there was nothing living on the planet that didn’t love the kind Cetra girl, not even the humans who had long renounced their Cetran way of life.

As she was so beloved by the land she walked upon, there was no one who dared stand in Aerith's path.  Where humans would block ancient footpaths to keep Cetra from crossing the mountain, they would erect bridges so that the daughter of the planet could safely cross.  When they would kill wolves and bears for their fur, they would lower their weapons if she asked them. Even animals would stop in her presence. Songbirds would sing to her from the trees and foxes came up to brush against her legs.  Mosquitos, did not bite at her skin as she slept, but then they bit no Cetra, as they were their creators hundreds of years ago. Some creatures even took it upon themselves to join Aerith in her travels, eventually becoming her constant companions.

There were two wolves, brothers that she had rescued from a human hunter’s trap and healed.  In return, they promised to remain by her side and protect Aerith from anything that might hurt her.  The two of them were mischievous creatures and never failed to bring a smile to Aerith's face when they played, or when one would trick the other.

Her third guardian was a great grizzly bear that revered the Cetra.  His own people had stories of the Cetra, a legendary race who healed the planet wherever they went.  Each of them could bring life to barren land simply by touching the ground, an in awe of finally meeting one, he decided to stay by her side and carry Aerith whenever she became too tired to walk.

The last member of their little party was a haughty mountain lion that thought himself greater than creatures who walked on two legs.  He had been languidly relaxing in a tree on day, and watched as Aerith crossed under the branch he was perched on.  She continued on her way, unaware, and he leapt from the tree with the intent to take his claws and rend the flesh from her bones, for no other reason than he wanted to.  The wolf brothers were quick to save their friend from the mountain lion, and Aerith suffered no injury.

As for the mountain lion, the wolves had wanted his pelt in retribution for trying to kill their friend.  Before they could do anything, Aerith stopped them.  Her reasoning was that if the mountain lion traveled with them, perhaps he would learn a thing or two about kindness and stop his arrogant behavior.  The bear nodded and the wolves seemed to agree, so the mountain lion reluctantly agreed to follow the Cetra girl.   He still complained as they traveled, but Aerith and her companions knew he didn't mean it at heart.

Eventually, Aerith became tired of the ceaseless journey her people were on, trying to find the Promised Land.  It seemed monotonous and she wished to simply see the world, and so left the company of her people.  They were sad to see her go, but knew that Aerith would be safe with her strange companions and Gaia to guide her.  As a true child of the planet, Gaia would protect her from anything that dared to hurt Aerith.

While she separated from the Cetra, Aerith didn't stop traveling.  She walked and walked, bringing life everywhere she went.  One place she visited was a blistering desert, the wind blowing sand into her eyes.  When she left, tall, hardy plants that could withstand the heat and drought were left behind, scattered across the sand that looked like strange monuments to a forgotten god.  

Another stop - a large, snowy plain - she crouched down and ran her hands over the snow.  The salt from her hands turned to seeds and little greet shoots emerged from the ground, the promise of something greater.  In hundreds of years, the seedlings would grow and grow and grow until they were proud, ancient trees, standing tall.

Aerith brough scrubby underbrush to harsh mountainsides and lush greenery to coasts.  She planted crops for humans, making sure that the harvests were plentiful and that they knew how to properly farm the land.  Gaia's voice grew stronger and stronger with every bit of foliage Aerith left behind, until even some humans could faintly hear Gaia once more.  Canyons and vast mountain ranges couldn't stop her, and she walked across plains and through old Cetra-grown forests, and in Aerith's wake was a trail of nature and life unlike anything the Humans or the Cetra had ever seen.

Amidst the trees and plants were strange little things that appeared wherever Aerith went.  Neither Cetra nor man had a name for them, only knew that it was the special Cetra girl who caused their appearance.  When the mountain lion, curious, asked the girl what they were, Aerith called them flowers.  You see, until Aerith was born, there were no flowers.  Oh, there were plants.  Yes, there were all sorts of plants before her.  There were trees and bushes and wild grasses, vegetables and grain, but no flowers.  Not like the ones you see today, like forget-me-nots and roses and lilies.  Flowers were something that only Aerith of the Cetra could grow, for she was the one closest to Gaia.

Humans stumbled upon Aerith's flowers one day.  They were stunned and amazed by the strange new plant, mesmerized by the colors they had only seen in the sky and their clothes and in each other's eyes in the petals of a flower.  All of them knew that it was the Cetra who had grown them, but it had been so long since their separation that humans had begun to forget that they too were Cetra, once.  It made them bitter and angry; why should the Cetra have special abilities? Why could the humans not grow flowers as Aerith did?  What did the Cetra have that they did not that captured Gaia's favor?

Their jealous thoughts coalesced until it became one voice of hatred.  It was loud enough to wake an evil spirit sealed under a mountain.  It had no name, but it was older than even the Cetra.  The spirit and Gaia hated each other, one a symbol of life and the other of destruction.  By extension, the malicious spirit hated the Cetra, as they were Gaia's children.  Before humans existed and when the Cetra were still new, the spirit had fought the Cetra, killing countless of the peaceful nomads.  They did their best to survive the fight, but in the end Gaia came to their aid and banished the evil spirit to a mountain prison of stone.  Defeated and with no way out the spirit swore revenge on the Cetra and Gaia before going into a slumber to wait for the right opportunity.  Sometimes, it would wake from its sleep and shake the walls of the mountain it was imprisoned in.  The mountain would spit fire and rain it down upon the humans and Cetra alike, in warning that the mountain would not hold it forever.

Elders who remembered the Cetra stories warned their villages to stay away from the summit lest the spirit use them as a vessel.  Most heeded their word, but one man didn't believe their stories about evil spirits and Cetra, thinking them to only be myths and nothing more.  He was young and foolish, and so one day he ventured too close to the mountain.

It was shaking that day, fire and brimstone coming down all around the man.  He continued, pushing forward, intent on reaching the foot of the mountain so that he could tell his village that the stories the elders spoke of were nothing more than old wives' tales they told to scare children into behaving.  As he drew near, the spirit in the mountain realized that if the man came close enough to its prison, he could be used to destroy the Cetra it so hated and free itself from the mountain.  So he stopped the mountain's quaking and let the human come closer.  Closer and closer he got, until the spirit was able to whisper in his ear as Gaia did to the Cetra.

It poisoned his mind with lies about the Cetra.  It told him that they were evil, that the Cetra were the ones who threw the humans away, stripping them of their rightful gifts and cut off their connection to Gaia because they were selfish and jealous.  It said that by killing the strongest of the Cetra, Aerith, humans would regain all their Cetran abilities that they lost centuries ago.  Humans would once again be able to speak to Gaia and grow plants as the Cetra did, and slowly, the spirit corrupted the man's mind, convincing him to take up a sword.

He traveled the planet, never ceasing in his quest to find Aerith.  Over hills and through forests his ancestors created, up into the mountains and crossing prairies the man went, searching everywhere for the Cetra girl and her companions.  At long last, he finally found Aerith in pilgrimage to the forgotten homeland of the Cetra in prayer.  Her escort was absent, waiting for their friend outside the temple.  

Taking his sword in hand, he ran Aerith through with it, killing her.  As her blood, red just like his, dripped onto the floor, he waited.  He waited to hear the soft voice of Gaia thrumming through his veins, to feel power at his fingertips, but it never came.  In fact, the only thing he could hear was the ceaseless, mocking laughter of the spirit.  He had fulfilled the spirit's task and gotten nothing from it, except now, the blood of an innocent stained his hands.

Smelling Aerith's blood, the brother wolves, bear, and mountain lion returned to where they had left Aerith and found the human man weeping over her body.  The four of them were furious at the man, for killing their friend, a child of the planet, an innocent Cetra who had done nothing but help the humans when she didn't have to.  Even the mountain lion, who had disliked Aerith in the beginning was angry and demanded that they rip the man to pieces in retribution for what he had done.  The younger wolf agreed with the mountain lion, but his brother turned to the bear for his answer.

The bear, wise in his age, saw that the man wept in genuine sorrow.  The others could not see it, blinded by their rage, and still asked the bear to kill him.  Instead, the bear asked if he was sorry for killing Aerith, and the man said yes.  The mountain lion and the wolf were not satisfied and wanted his blood to paint the floor as Aerith's was, even if the man had apologized.  It didn't change the fact that Aerith was now dead.  The bear, resolute in his opinion, reminded them that if Aerith were alive, she would not want them to kill, even in her name.

Knowing that the bear was right, the wolf and the mountain lion reluctantly left the man leave unharmed.  All four of them watched as he left the mountain, wallowing in grief as he returned to his village to tell them what he had done.  When they were sure he was gone, they carefully lifted Aerith, still bleeding, onto the bear's back and carried her to where Gaia's presence was the strongest, leaving a splattered trail of crimson on the ground..  When they told Gaia that its daughter was dead, it shook the planet in its grief.

The kind Cetra that brought the flowers was no more.  There was nothing that could bring her back, as Gaia's power could only create life, not return it.  In mourning, Gaia raised flowers from the earth where Aerith's blood graced the ground in memoriam of the girl who loved to cultivate them.  They bloomed in the invisible wake of Aerith's every step, red buds blossoming all across the snowy plain where she had planted a forest, petals the colors of a flame bursting from the desert cacti, hearty wildflowers growing on the mountain paths the Cetra had crossed.  All these flowers would remain on the planet as Aerith's legacy, as proof she lived, and this is where the flowers that we see today come from, much like how Aphrodite rose from the sea foam created of Ouranous's blood.

**Author's Note:**

> come check out my [discord](https://discord.gg/acjRmqm) and other [tumblr](https://sacrasm.tumblr.com)


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